“The dry leaf smells like the green pack Extra gum. Which is kind of awesome because I love the green pack of Extra gum. The liquid has a few notes of that Extra gum sweetness but there’s a...”
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29 Tasting Notes

I’m not a big green tea drinker, but I am a sucker for gunpowder green tea + spearmint. Something about the combination of that “vegetable green” taste and mint just soothes me. The low stimulant factor makes it a great nighttime tea too. For two years I purchased Moroccan Mint from Teavana to satisfy my gunpowder green + spearmint cravings. Kusmi included a sample of this in one of my orders and one taste had me hooked. I tossed out the Teavana blend in favor of this and never looked back!

Preparation

The first thing I noticed about this one is how wonderful it smells – fresh, strong, sweet spearmint, right from the get go! I prefer spearmint to peppermint in general, but spearmint teas seem relatively scarce in comparison, so I’m pleased to have found this one from Kusmi. The dry leaf is very dark green and tightly rolled. There’s no indication on the tin of the variety of green tea this is, but I would guess Gunpowder from looking at the leaves alone. I could be wrong, but that’s my educated guess. For my cup, I used 1 tsp of leaf, and gave it 2 minutes in water cooled to around 180 degrees. The resulting liquor is a golden yellow, and smells primarily of spearmint with an underlying hint of green tea.

To taste, this one reminds me a bit of chewing gum, or softmints. It has the same intense initial sweet mint flavour, which lingers decently into the aftertaste. Spearmint is pretty much all I’m getting from this one, so it comes across fairly one note, but if spearmint is what you’re looking for, then it’s certainly what you’ll get. I had thought I’d be able to taste the green tea base a little more, but it remains firmly in the background. There’s the tiniest hint of it right at the end of the sip, but in a blind tasting you could tell me this was a pure spearmint tea and I’d probably be none the wiser.

Preparation

Whoa, thats minty! Spearminty! Toothpastey! The super minty smell appealed to me to try it, even though I’m more of a peppermint person. It is pretty minty, not enough to feel like you cleaned your teeth, but enough to have a minty taste linger for awhile in your mouth. The smokey gunpowder tea is an interesting contrast. Not bad and very refreshing.

The weather here in Boston has been rather Morrocan of late, so I figured that this would be a good time to try out Kusmi’s version of Morrocan Mint tea. I have had this small tin for a while, but I usually change my mind upon lifting the lid, as the preponderance of spearmint makes me realize that this is not really a good first green of the day choice—at least not for me.

The appearance of the dried tea reminds me of an old can of Republic of Tea Morrocan Mint. I must never have developed a liking for it, because it eventually became so old that I ended up throwing it away when I moved.

Gunpowder green appears to be the tea, and the mint of course is spearmint. This tastes okay, but it’s not my favorite combination. I should get my hands on some straight-up high-grade gunpowder to see whether I like that tea. In the past, I tried some middling versions with left me with a negative impression of the entire genre.

Flavors: Mint

Preparation

My boyfriend just accepted a job in Boston and will be moving there in September, which means I will be visiting from time to time and will probably move there when I graduate (hopefully next year?). So, we might be neighbors sometime in the future :-)

I’m usually a fan of Moroccan mint teas so I figured I’d enjoy this. Oh my gosh, is it MINTY! I smelled the mint in the mailbox before I even opened up the package… he he

I steeped up a pot of it this morning in my little red Stump teapot. It definitely looks like a pellet-shaped gunpowder green tea and is a dark yellow in color. I am finding the spearmint in this blend to be a bit overwhelming to say the least. I like Moroccan mint teas where you can taste a bit of the smoky green underneath it and I’m not getting that here. I wonder how this is flavored and could you please tone it down, Kusmi? hee hee.

This seems to be a common theme between Kusmi and I — their flavored teas just seem a bit too flavored for me.

Anyway I tried this plain and then added a bit of sugar, it is good both ways but I do sort of feel like I’m drinking toothpaste. I put the rest in my Lupicia cooler to cold brew, as I’m thinking this would be really nice with tomorrow’s lunch and a few ice cubes might tone it down a bit as well.

Yum yum yum! I cold steeped this one for about 12 hours (1 heaping tsp for 8 oz) and it came out very tasty indeed. It’s very refreshingly spearminty – I don’t really taste green tea at all to be honest. I added some syrup because I like my minty things to be a little sweet. This would be amazing after you’ve been outside on a hot day, it’s so cooling and relaxing.

I think I may try this one again with a shorter steep time just to see if I can get a combination of green tea and spearmint flavors, but I am finding it very yummy as is. I’m going to bump up the rating a couple points. :)

Preparation

This is not my favorite green-mint blend. Kousmi used to have a better one with a stronger mint flavor and pieces of rock sugar mixed in, since the N. African taste is to drink it very sweet. I prefer the spearmint-green blend from TeaGschwedner, which also makes Le Touareg—gunpowder green with peppermint. Extremely strong and addictive!

The dry leaves smell delicious, and a little bit of the tea goes a long way. I love green tea, and the mint flavor was not overpowering like in most minty teas. This tea has the perfect balance between earthy and refreshing.